It had been a long day in the Eastern Seaboard Bank Building in Wading Way. The effects of the recent Terminus Invasion had been felt, and everyone was rushing to keep up with the resulting workload. Amidst the chaos, it had been decided to move the bank's already small gold deposit to another location. After all, Freedom City was teeming with super villains as it were.

They never got the chance. The moment the gold had left the vault, a group of two heavily armored men, all covered in shining gold, emerged from the nearest staircases. They moved quickly and with purpose, quickly taking down any the guards that got in their way, before heading towards the exit with the gold, carried in a pair of heavy bags.

The alarms sounded soon after, easily being heard out in the streets. After all, this was Freedom City. While the city home to villains, it was also the home of heroes.

WEST has a small office just the other side of the street (or thereabouts). It was here that Replica came to see Dr Norris North who sat, pressing his temples, anxiety perfusing his sweat. The message had just said URGENT! VERY URGENT!

"We have a serious problem" he muttered, not pleased with said problem.

"I think we have a rogue AI. Some idiot hacker has taken the brakes off a traffic control system. We were already getting concerned about the experimental code in the quantum computer ASTRO labs installed there. Now it looks like the traffic is going,...well...mental...." he explained, not happy with his explanation.

"WEST is meant to head off these threats before the brown stuff hits the fan" he said, dissapointed. "Now, we are against the clock. And I am thin, to say the best, on resources. I hope you can handle computers. Please tell me you can handle computers! You said you could handle computers!"

Freedom City, Actually, I'm not sure where, one of the alleys by the E-Sea Bank? Kind of a blur, frankly

"Boss won't forget this, mask!" The words were seriously meant, but the contempt was undercut by the fact that the man in the suit saying them was, himself, wearing a balaclava.

His business partners were too busy recovering from sudden, repeated blunt force happening to them to do much but glare. the merchandise were already out of the truck, blinking uncertainly and huddled in a knot. Two of the kids had swiped a cell phone from one of their captors. It was hard to feel strongly about stealing right then. If you'd asked John where they were likely from, he might have guessed Angola. Why and how they had shown up in the truck was something that would be figured out once he'd reasoned with the businessmen.

"You're wasting your time, mask!" The man was perking up now "My people will have me free in a month!"

"Not if you tell him you have people," pointed out one of the quieter, wiser souls lying face-first on the rain-slick asphalt, "way to prejudice the judge against your counsel, man."

Wading way was a nice neighbourhood, anyone you asked would tell you so, lots of strong local businesses operated out of there so there was a lot of opportunity for work and a strong economy, resilient even in the face of the rampant meta-human events that seemed to be perpetually going on around the infamous city of heroes, which thanks to the wealth and affluence of its occupants seemed to weather the storms of energy blasts and super strength backed blows better than other neighbourhoods.

They had been enjoying a nice run of good weather as of late, perfect infact for taking ones lunch out to the various civic parks or even just to the bench around the corner from your workplace, it had all been going so well, but then, it usually was before something kicked off.

That in this case a bright red steam locomotive ripped through the air with a thrumming cascade of light and strange energies, was something novel but hardly unique in the face of day to day occurrences, many watched none nonplussed it it slid across the ground smoothly, held aloft on a cushion of light and air and pulled up outside the bank.

A scant few moments the doors flung open and a crowed of extremely similar looking cowboys, far more than one would reasonable expect to fit into the cab of such a vehicle, raced from the street into the glassy front doors of the wading way 3rd national bank.

The business world was surprised today by the announcement of the retirement of Grant Conglomerate CEO Jonathan Grant (57). Even more surprising was the announcement of the appointed of his daughter Sarah Grant (28) to the position. Ms. Grant has been a champion of metahuman and alien right and averment critic of her own father.

FEUD WITH MARSTECH DEEPENS

by Dancia Devons

The Grant Conglomerate has pulled out of a co-project with MARSTECH to develop the new Spartoi Powered Armor for the US Army, citing severe mismanagement of the project.

It had been a day since Alexa and Zhu had moved in together. And already the pair were making a run to Greatest Grabs to replace broken machinery from a night of enthusiastic experimenting. Greatest Grabs a high-end electronic store on the Wading Way with the appearance of a commercial establishment to draw in more patrons. Whether those patrons could actually afford their wares was another matter entirely.

But, it was the time of the year for sales. At such affordable prices, even two high school students would have no trouble in making a purchase or two. Not alone to this line of thought the pair found themselves having to wade through a crowded store. Ending up in the stereo section purely by a matter of pedestrian congestion. A shove here, a push there, and their aisle was chosen for them.

Tellers working lunch hours at a bank knew they were a part of the peak shift. It was the busy period when everyone could sneak away from their day to make a quick withdrawal or deposit without disrupting whatever else they had going on. That extra bit of traffic alone would account for the increase in pay for anyone working the busy shift. Anywhere else that is. For Freedom City's own E-Sea, the prime tellers were instead earning hazzard pay.

Yet again the popular destination for criminals whose plans started and stopped with the words 'I want to rob a bank today', was being held up. "This is a hold up! If you don't want to get a taste of my Devil Ray's you'll--uh shut up. Yeah just shut up or else." A distorted voice called out from a jet black demonic looking helmet. It was the all too familiar site of the infamous Devil Ray.

The Crime League's own superarmored aquatic thug was pointing his gauntlets at everyone. While three men wearing animal themed luchador masks (A wolf, puffer fish, and owl respectively) backed him up. The trio were making demands to be let into the safety deposit box whilst Devil Ray continued to simply bully the victims in the bank lobby. A result of which began to bring media attention to the latest E-Sea robbery.

Huang stepped out of hte Cab with a hint of a cocky smile despite the wince at the late summer sun glinting off the towers of steel and glass all around them. There were many benefits of living in a major metropolis not the least of which was not having a driver's license for date night was easily countered by the preponderance of cabs and the fact that in a place like freedom driving was more the exception than the rule if one aimed for downtown. He certainly could have just cracked a portal through time and space to his destination of course. Though he had been informed that such casual use of magic would lead directly to further sanctions on his mystic machinations from his hypocrite parents. Besides his dad already thought his date was a bad influence. Flashing blood magic portals on a downtown street probably wouldn't help that.

Turning to peek into the cab he reached out a hand, "And here we are." he presented like the occupant might find the garish pyramid themed building anything but appropriative. "I heard they do a mediterranean paleo-vegan chefs special." he offered encouragingly.

]]>9737Mon, 22 May 2017 04:11:07 +0000The Story Of Tonight (IC)https://www.freedomplaybypost.com/topic/9564-the-story-of-tonight-ic/
March 2017

Wading Way

The Blanchard Center (Freedom's Fourth Best Conference Venue!)

6PM

Down below on the conference room floor, the tech representatives, executives, and families were circulating, spending the last couple of hours on the conference floor before supper started at 6:30. Through their ranks, a predator stalked - though you wouldn't have known it to look at him. His suit and tie didn't fit exactly right - he needed specially cut suits to accommodate his binder anyway, and his arms were considerably bulkier than his counterpart's in this dimension, but plenty of teenage guys didn't quite fit into the suits designed for an adult's frame anyway. He'd left most of his gear on the rooftop across the street, the same place he'd used as a base to spy on this place (by means of binoculars by night), so here he just looked like any other smart teenager with an eye for miniaturized portable computers. Just the sort of thing he could use to make a really awesome bolt....

One eye closed, he sighted down the length of one particular chip, getting a strange look from the man behind the table. "Just looking," he commented, setting the chip back down. "What kind of heat tolerance do you have here?"

The crowd of strangers moving from table to table behind him was hardly on his mind at all - well, relatively speaking, anyway.

As far as company reps went, the people sent by ailing power and research firm Redshift Energy of Washington weren't much to inspire confidence. Mostly either noticeably young new blood still uncomfortable in their stiff shirts, or old company men who had the tired, rumpled look of somebody going through the motions until retirement, they filled the meeting room with a nervous atmosphere.

Meanwhile, quite at his ease, a African-American man in his late twenties had already taken his seat and was quickly reading over a briefcase full of papers crammed with atomic formulae. One of his associates had to quickly nudge him in the shoulder to alert him the entrance of their host at Summit Transnational, Amir ibn Jafar ibn Abd al-Aziz al-Misri. With a hurried, apologetic and distracted smile, the man stood up and joined the other reps.

An older man stepped up, offering his pale, soft hand to the imposing philanthropist. "Er, Michael Monday, Mr. Misri, of Redshift Energy. Glad you could meet us, it's a wonderful opportunity for both of our companies." All the Redshift people tried to look like they agreed, the young man with the briefcase looking entirely, naturally confident in contrast.

Outside, the city was frosted with snow and clinging ice, but in the conference room the pale sunlight mingled with the warm florescents to cast a strangely tranquil TV-like colour over the walls and long table.

Very thoughtfully, someone had put coffee and pastries around, so everyone could be even more jittery than they already were.

Being a bank is always a hazardous proposition, even under the best of circumstances. Having millions of dollars all kept in a single location can make a tempting target for any so-inclined lowlifes in the area, no matter how well-guarded said millions of dollars may be. In Freedom City, this goes double. Some would think that being located in the superhero center of the world would make the banks a less tempting target. In fact, it only serves to attract a very specific type of robber - the type that wears tights and wields death rays.

However, even in Freedom City, there are unusual sights. Two of these unusual sights were just now shambling into the Eastern Seaboard Bank, mute and rotting. A pair of grey-skinned, half-decomposed corpses, clad in tattered suits, their eyes filmy and their mouths hanging open as if in silent shock. A security guard, reacting with commendable presence of mind, grabs for his sidearm and manages to fire three shots into one of the corpses' chest before it, with frightening speed, backhands him and sends him sprawling twenty feet.

Screams break out - immediately nearly everyone in the bank begins streaming out through the doors, past the creatures, who don't seem the least bit interested in the fleeing civilians. Only the bank tellers remain where they are, crouching behind the bulletproof-glass partitions at their stations. One of the creatures staggers up to the counter, and mutely slams down a large, moldy burlap sack on the surface. A wooden sign is hung around its neck - the words "MONEY IN BAG" painted crudely upon it.

With well-practiced and only slightly feigned calm, one of the tellers reaches unseen under the table and repeatedly mashes the silent alarm button...

The day started off innocently enough for the cozy FCCU branch. The clerks were looking forward to their respective lunch breaks when a pair of unmarked black vans pulled up. Before anyone even took particular notice, eight men armed with black masks and assault rifles barged in.

Four of them began shouting for clerks and patrons alike to get on the ground, two began making their way to the vault, and two got to work systematically shooting out security cameras. Whoever they were, they knew what they were doing. The clerks couldn't even manage to pull the alarm before being stopped at gunpoint...

]]>8808Tue, 02 Feb 2016 02:04:14 +0000Home is where the Bamf ishttps://www.freedomplaybypost.com/topic/8370-home-is-where-the-bamf-is/Wading Way

10:00 16th June 2015

It was a warm but overcast day and Freedom City was getting on with the important business of getting things done. But being Freedom City things never seem to be able to happen without supers getting involved.

And with a flash of anti-light and the smell of sulphur someone who looks like he’s come from a fantasy film or video game, staff and all, appears in the middle of the road which would be dangerous to him if it wasn’t for the two large demon flanking him. With words in a strange language he gestures to an Armored Car stuck in traffic and the two demon make their way through the traffic to do his bidding.

A man in his forties, his short hair starting to turn gray, stood grinning in front of the camera; he was dressed in an odd looking uniform that would suit a late 19th century military officer better than a modern day man, modified however with what looked like a steam boiler carried as a backpack, connected by tubes and pipes to the strange rifle the man was currently waving around.

Behind him, the bank's surveillance cameras showed a number of robots in a similar Jules Verne fashion, some human-sized and carrying pikes or rifles, others larger, busy rounding up the terrified people that were until moments before going on with their day to day business.

"For those who don't know me, my name is Steampunk, and I'm here to make a statement. Emily Stenford, better known as Mechanized, you fancy yourself a heroine and a savior of Freedom City, thanks to the high-tech suit you're wearing. A suit that by all means should have been developed by me! But I guess it was easy for Daddy's girl to get me fired and keep all your company's high tech gear for yourself.

No matter! Look at what I have accomplished, with steam technology and magic alone! Come face me, if you dare, and I will show you once and for all, on live TV, who's the best engineer! Or perhaps, you're too coward to show up, and you'll leave all these innocent hostages in my hands?"

]]>8135Tue, 10 Mar 2015 09:02:46 +0000Night Lighthttps://www.freedomplaybypost.com/topic/8089-night-light/Mirror ambled his way around Wading Way, it was just after the sun had set, and it was quieter now then it had been all day. Twirling his cane, he hummed quietly to himself as he watched the invisible spirit, Mary, peer down various alleys, and into buildings, when she could, as she tried to get a good look at a part of the city she had been to very rarely.

"Oh come on, slow down. I want to get a good look at this stuff, you never bring me down here, and your world has so much new stuff in it."

She said as they passed by another Bank where some of the Employees were still cleaning up.

"Why don't you ever listen to me? You never do anything for me, please, just, this once?"

No longer caring about appearances, if someone wandered up on him, his outfit alone said something was off.

"Because, Mary, when I come down here I usually don't have time to be slow. However, tonight there hasn't been anything, so I guess I'll slowdown so you can take a closer look around. I'd say behave, but no one else can interact with you."

Humming to himself once more, Mirror slowed down, and sighed, looking up at the sky. Mary was a bit of a pain, constantly bugging him, but he couldn't complain much, he could do things most people couldn't even dream of thanks to her. Though, it would be nice to have a distraction around, talking to a voice in your head, even with the way he's dressed up, tends to worry most people.

Marcus Lane was his name. He was a young man with chiselled looks, a mop of slightly unruly blonde hair and bright blue eyes the female staff often swam in. He wasn't the best dressed, the tallest or the broadest guy in the building, but he had a natural charm and cheekbones you could chop vegetables in.

At the end of the week, the staff were winding down after five gruelling days of writing and reporting. Marcus was high on coffee, as always, and never stopped smiling or running low on gas.

He thrust a takeaway cup of Dancia's favourite beverage into her hand. How did he know what to buy? A bit of observation, a bit of interest...

"I know this great Thai place, just 10 minutes walk. I'll buy!" he added, confident and bristling with energy.

The Wading Way was best known for the towering office buildings that dominated the Freedom City skyline, the most easily recognizable being the three towers of Pyramid Plaza, but even it had a few small greenspaces wedged in among the business that dominated the area. While miniscule compared to Liberty Park, the Promenade or even Riverside Park, they still had plenty of trees, bushes and other plants to provide a discrete location for Stesha Lumins (more widely known as Fleur de Joie) to make a discrete appearance.

One of Stesha's teammates on the Freedom League, Megan Howell (better known as Velocity) had called yesterday asking to meet with the greenhaired woman at Megan's apartment in this part of town. That building stood just across the street from the park Stesha arrived at, rising up over forty stories into the air. Megan's was up on the thirty seventh floor.

It had been several months ago that Megan had come to visit Stesha at her home in Sanctuary, to talk about Megan's recent encounter with a former lover (a man named Robert Harrow) and learning that she might someday have a son with Robert who would have powers that allowed him to seemingly destroy entire timelines. In large part based on some of Stesha's advice, Megan had renewed her relationship with Robert, and had Stesha had gotten a number of reports about how well things seemed to be going over the intervening months.

There had been an incident in early June where pieces of some sort of prototype to the Stopwatch that Robert had wielded during the earlier encounter in February that had led to Megan learning about their future son. But Megan had been able to handle gathering the fragments of that prototype Stopwatch with the assistance of an android named Hronos that had powers allowing it to control time, as well as Robert and a female archeologist/adventurer named Heather Steed.

Since that incident, everything Stesha had heard from Megan seemed to suggest that things were continuing to go well. Early in October, the younger woman had even indicated that she and Robert were investing together in a property on an island in Fiji. In fact, Stesha had not seen Megan in well over a week, as Megan had gone to spend some time with Robert at their new home on the South Pacific island.

But then Megan had called yesterday, stating she needed some advice and to talk, though the young speedster had not provided much else in the way of details.

Eve Martel had been paying a brief, albeit incisive, visit to her family's local holdings in the city, catching up on the sometimes quick, sometimes slow but always continuing advancement of human knowledge that Martel Enterprises assisted. In the main lobby she and the three research leads were making their final polite goodbyes as the day shift began making way for the night, when a noise of somebody frantically running downstairs interrupted them, the four turning to see Dr. Florence Bridges practically leap the last staircase and come racing up to them, eyes wide, graying brown hair nearly shaken out of its bun.

Nearly colliding with the quartet, she caught herself a few feet from them and stood for a few seconds, gulping in air before she managed to gasp out "M-Miss Martel! It's Garamond, h-he's vanished! I was in the r-r-room with him, talking about that new species of bact-anyway, I looked away for a second to get a book from his shelf, and when I looked back he had just...just disappeared!"

The research leads glanced at each other, one of them deftly slipping the radio from her belt and calling security sotto voce, one of the others moving to calm Dr. Bridges while the third turned quickly to Eve "It might be best to evacuate the building, with your leave I'll start sending word to the employees"

Meanwhile, the dignified-looking man attempting to lead Dr. Bridges to a chair suddenly asked sharply "Doctor, where's your radio?" Florence looked dazedly at the empty spot on her belt, then stiffened. "I...I had it when I went to his office, maybe I dropped it...no. It was gone when I turned around too!"

The observation deck at the top of Pyramid Plaza was empty, save for one woman. No one else wanted to be in there right now, except for the people who were paid to be there.

Around twenty minutes ago, the young woman had entered the observation deck. There wasn't much odd about here - sweatshirts, jeans, sneakers, short and somewhat untamed hair. She stood before the windows of the deck for about five minutes, not moving. And then she'd started pressing her hands against the glass, and slowly, it had begun to crack. The visitors began to move back when they saw what was happening, while the guards quickly moved forward. They didn't get within ten feet of the girl - she looked at them, and within seconds, they were asleep, passed out on the ground. In two minutes, she was the only person left at the top of the Pyramid. In five, the glass on all sides had cracked, with nothing but air surrounding the frame of the peak.

For ten minutes, she stood up there, looking out over the city. Looking out... and waiting. STAR personnel were sweeping over the scene, keeping their rifles trained on the pyramid in case anything happened. The heroes would be arriving soon enough; if nothing went haywire until they arrived, maybe this could end peacefully.
]]>6786Wed, 27 Feb 2013 06:39:31 +0000Independent Threatshttps://www.freedomplaybypost.com/topic/6986-independent-threats/

GM

July 6th, 2013

Pyramid Plaza, Freedom City

7:42 AM

Pyramid Plaza was crowded with runners, volunteers, and on-lookers as the last touches were put on the dayâ€™s big event. The red-white-and-blue arch straddling Wading Way was already up, with gold and blue balloons tethered to it and ready to fly off. Volunteers were standing behind folding tables, signing in the last few attendees, while other runners stood in close knots or began stretching in preparation of the dayâ€™s activities.

Off to one side, a line of news vans were lined up, and several reporters were shooting second or third takes for the morning news. One reporter, however, was preparing for a live broadcast. Melissa Zhong checked her appearance in a hand mirror one last time, made sure her audio lead was invisible and her microphone was working, and took her position in front of the camera. â€œTen second, â€˜Liz,â€ the cameraman said. â€œTen, nine, eight, sevenâ€¦â€

On cue the light went on and the reporterâ€™s face broke into a pleasant, sunny smile. â€œGood morning, Freedom City,â€ she said. â€œThis is Melissa Zhong, with Channel Four news in the morning, reporting live from Pyramid Plaza!â€ She walked and the cameraman rotated, swinging the view from the Channel Four van to the base triple towers, an icon of the cityâ€™s skyline. Right now though the view was crowded with people, and Melissa indicated the crowds with a sweep of her arm. â€œHundreds have come out for todayâ€™s run, the 41st Annual Independence Day Charity Marathon. Almost every corporation in the city, from Dawes Tech to Martel Industries to Majestic Industries, has sponsored at least one group running here today.â€

The reporter plunged into the crowd and the cameraman followed. They quickly zeroed in on one young red-blonde woman, as she stretched and checked a device hanging from her neck. â€œSpeaking of which, hereâ€™s Jessica Parker herself! Ms. Parker, who are you running for today?â€

]]>6986Fri, 28 Jun 2013 23:22:33 +0000Getting Back Into the Game (IC)https://www.freedomplaybypost.com/topic/6996-getting-back-into-the-game-ic/Pyramid Plaza, Freedom City

Thursday June 27, 2013

8:20 AM

The sun had been up in Freedom City for close to three hours already. On most days, Jack Oâ€™Conner would have been in the office before the sun came up, but last night he had spent a good bit the night tracking some Mafia goons through Southside until he was able to catch them in the act of picking up a shipment of drugs. Accordingly, his day was starting a little bit later than usual. At least he had an easy "commute."

The elevator that had carried the young CEO of Freedom Consolidated from his penthouse on the 90th floor of Tower One, arrived with a *DING* at the company's offices on the 65th floor of the same tower. It was a short walk from the elevator bank to reception area, where Jack was greeted by the bright and cheerful face of the receptionist, Whitney Wilcox.

"Good morning Mr. O'Conner." Whitney said in greeting. A fairly recent graduate of Freedom City University, she was an attractive brunette. Along with her energetic personality, the young woman had great attention to detail and was always willing to take on extra projects for various departments.

He was done for the evening, not that Summit was done. Considering the global markets and other things the day tended to blur, and lord know he rarely slept anymore these days. So he turned off the lights in his office as he left and took the elevator down to the main floor, to have a chat with some of the guys who worked the Asian markets. It was something he tried to do at least once a month, or as often as he could muster. With the ding of the elevator opening he stepped out onto the floor and made his way towards the APAC markets section of it. Amir looked his less than stellar form, rumpled and not in the calculated way he tended to be at social engagements. It was almost midnight, which meant that the guys who handled India would be about now.

Stopping he chatted with some of the janitors, guys who had seen a bump in pay recently along with better benefits, to help mitigate their desire to engage in corporate espionage. Grabbing one of the haggard interns attempting to adapt to the schedule, he told him to go get coffees for everyone, and stuffed some bills into the kid's breast pocket.

In downtown Freedom City, the shops about the base of Pyramid Plaza bustled with customers looking to make up for the day prior's holiday. The spring weather meant lighter jackets than the receding winter chill had necessitated but the light cloud cover kept the breeze cool as shopping bags were juggled and grumpy children coming down from an excess of cheap chocolate added to the general din of the street.

That noise was abruptly overshadowed by a booming rumble in the skies above, the clouds directly over top the towering Plaza darkening into storm clouds without warning. Another peal of thunder sounded almost immediately, lightning flashing amidst the slate coloured sky, red-tinged and angry. A city all too familiar with the malicious exploits of Dr. Stratos and similar villains glanced upward warily, the more cautious among the shoppers already looking for the shelter of overhangs or awnings. Even they were surprised, however, when a streak of blindingly crimson lightning speared downward and struck the middle of the street, sending bits of pulverized pavement flying outward.

There was just enough time for panicked screams to register as vehicles were abandoned and pedestrians fled backward from the manhole cover sized crater before another bolt struck the same spot, accompanied by another boom of thunder. The next bolt came more quickly, then another even sooner after, building to a column of white hot fury searing a red after-image into the vision of those brave or foolish enough to still be watching.

Just as suddenly the barrage from on high stopped, nearby shopfronts still vibrating from the reverberating thunder. At the center of the cracked street and the circle of hastily vacated cars stood a young man looking inquisitively about with piercing grey eyes. Appearing no more than seventeen, he had a slim, well defined build amply displayed by his lack of shirt and a skirt of overlapping white cloth bordered with red. Simple sandals adorned his feet while ornate gold armlets stood out against flawless skin bronzed from the sun and thick dreadlocks of deep red hair. Black markings framing his eyes completed the look of someone who had just stepped out an Ancient Egypt exhibit at the nearby Hunter Museum.

Placing his hands on his hips, the figure offered the stunned crowd a broad, self-assured grin. "Hail, mortal realm!" he greeted them resoundingly, a note of laughter in his voice as he threw his arms up into the air. "Tis good to be back!"

The day had dawned much like most slightly damp January days in New Jersey, the sun reflecting off the skyscrapers and sending its shafts blazing through the streets.

The inhabitants of the Branson Building, that glittering spire of the dawn representing the Roseus Corporation, had begun their daily routines with the calm that had only a couple of weeks ago been shattered. Freedonians were hardy, and had pressed on through worse times than that, however!

As Agatha Benson slammed into the glass window and fell to the floor just a second before her desk went sailing out in a hail of shards, she thought to herself 'What did we do, God?!' a fitting question, though sadly unlikely to be answered, the office building rapidly becoming a scene of chaos as windows were smashed open, offices ransacked by costumed figures, and the security staff fled out into the streets screaming in wide-eyed terror!

Already the citizens not fleeing were taking pictures as they sought to begin. Police and ambulances were summoned as news spread of a supervillain attack!